Shares of Aspen Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ: AZPN) will see a huge rally in today’s trading, after moving the company announced that fourth-quarter financial results. The stock reached as high as $ 17.15 mid-day trading, and the last check was up 13.83% to $ 15.80, the average daily volume of 579,820 to 1,840,000. The set is a 52-week range of $ 9.14 – $ 17.53. Currently trading above the 50-day and 200 day moving average. The stock gained 19.97% in the last three trading sessions.

Shares of Dycom Industries Inc. (NYSE: DY) is soaring in today’s trading, after moving the company disclosed its fourth quarter financial results. The stock reached as high as $ 15.95 mid-day trading, and the last check was up 10.41% to $ 15.27, the average daily volume of 383,962 to 1,390,000. The set is a 52-week range of $ 7.30-$ 18.78. Currently trading below the 50-day and 200 day moving averages. The stock gained 20.54% in the last three trading sessions.
Shares of Peregrine Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: PPHN) is rallying today’s trading, after moving the company reported a promising median overall survival 20.7 months, Phase 2 study in advanced breast cancer. Small cap stocks have reached a high $ 1.88 mid-day trading, and the last check was up 12.21% to $ 1.47, the average daily volume of 486,038 to 1,860,000. The set is a 52-week range of $ 1.17 – $ 3.10. Currently trading below the 50-day and 200 day moving averages. The stock gained 16.53% in the last three trading sessions.

College is expensive, and as a parent it can seem daunting to figure out how you’re going to get your child through college without pushing the limits of your credit card or refinancing the house. With smart investments, you can generate the growth and funds to get JR to college without breaking the bank.

One of the first basic and seemingly obvious steps, is to cut unnecessary expenses to increase the amount of money in your budget to invest with. Ultimately, in the end, you’ll need to figure out what investments are going make your portfolio work for you, giving your child an advantage over others that ultimately end up in debt just to pay for college. We did some research with the help of our Motley Fool researchers here;

3 kinds of stocks
As with any investment goal, the best portfolio for college savings acknowledges the time frame you have to invest as well as the competing considerations of risk and reward that you have to weigh. If you start early, then you may have 15 to 20 years before you need to worry about exhausting your college fund, giving you maximum flexibility to invest. But even if you get off to a late start — say, with just eight to 10 years left — you can still use these three categories of stocks to help guide you:

• High-impact growth stocks. Aggressive companies with good growth prospects can give you very high returns, but they’re not for the meek.
• Undervalued opportunity stocks. Taking advantage of values in the market gives you an inherent advantage over paying full price.
• Cash-paying dividend stocks. You’ll eventually need to start taking money out of your college portfolio, and dividend stocks will help you with income without having to sell shares.

• Let’s take these in turn. 

Great growth

• Growth stocks give you the best chance to turn small investments into huge payoffs. But they also come with higher risk, and their popularity can make them more expensive than they’re worth. The current economic troubles have been problematic for many growth stocks, but some have bucked the trend. 
• Intuitive Surgical (Nasdaq: ISRG) continues to see its unique robotic surgical devices used in new procedures, and even in a recession, growth has continued. With such potential, even paying 30 times 2011 estimates may not be too pricey. A riskier play is A-Power Energy (Nasdaq: APWR), which trades at a forward earnings multiple of just 6. However, it’s disappointed investors the past two quarters with earnings misses, so you need to have confidence that small and medium-sized users will want to generate their own power. 

Great values

Growth isn’t everything. Even slower-growing powerhouses can be great investments over time when the price is right. Right now is a great time for value-priced stocks. JPMorgan Chase (NYSE: JPM), for instance, trades at book value and 12 times earnings and appears to have emerged largely unscathed from the financial crisis. Transocean (NYSE: RIG) will be mired in the aftermath of the Gulf oil spill for some time, but at seven times earnings and below book value, it’s a value play that could pay off if the worst-case Gulf scenario doesn’t play out. Great dividends

More than anything, dividend-paying stocks do what other investments don’t: show you the money, quarter in and quarter out. The best long-term plays combine a good yield with great ongoing dividend growth. Chevron (NYSE: CVX) is a great example of such a stock. Paying 3.5% now, Chevron has increased its dividend at a 10% clip over the past five years, and has a 19-year history of hiking its payouts every year. Procter & Gamble (NYSE: PG) has an even more impressive track record, with 56 straight years of higher dividends and around 12% annual dividend growth since 2005 to go with its 3% yield. Alternatively, a dividend ETF can help with this part of your college savings. Vanguard Dividend Appreciation (NYSE: VIG) pursues stocks like Chevron and P&G among dozens of others. It’s a simple way to get broad dividend stock exposure.

Using stocks to get your child through college, definitely isn’t a sure thing, but these stocks seemingly have all the right qualities of a good investment, and these aren’t the only ones out there with the same benefits. Do your research and follow the simple rules, and you should be at the very least, able to save up a good amount for college.

In an economic slump you have to hunt for where the growth that will drive the recovery starts. Looking at young adults that tend to opt for luxury, gaming and telecom are all places where you can defy gravity. Looking good, feeling good and prospecting for new revenue are places where expenses are not often spared.

We can start with lululemon athletica (Nasdaq: LULU), which earned $0.30 a share when analysts were only banking on a profit of $0.24 a share.

The retailer specializes in high-end athletic apparel for women, and the chain’s 31% spike in same-store sales proves that you can still move luxury goods in the iffy economic climate. There’s a reason why pricey denim sellers True Religion (Nasdaq: TRLG)and Joe’s Jeans (Nasdaq: JOEZ) posted double-digit revenue growth this past quarter. If a trend is hot enough, it defies the math of discretionary income.

Ciena (Nasdaq: CIEN) is also ahead of the pros. The telco networking specialist posted an adjusted quarterly loss of $0.09 a share. This may be roughly double the red ink that Ciena sported a year earlier, but Wall Street was targeting a deficit of $0.33 a share, making this loss a relative victory.

Finally, Shuffle Master (NYSE: SHFL) investors like the hand they’re being dealt. The maker of automatic cash shufflers and other casino equipment earned $0.13 a share on an adjusted basis, ahead of both the $0.10 a share it posted a year ago, and the $0.12 a share that analysts were expecting.

The gaming industry took its lumps during the recession, but casino operator Las Vegas Sands (NYSE: LVS) has hit fresh 52-week highs in recent weeks, while Wynn Resorts(Nasdaq: WYNN) has come within a penny of doing so.

These picks all have shown legs because weak in the knew consumer demand isn’t holding them back. Finding these kinds of plays is what will make the difference between a smart well constructed lineup vs. also ran dogs that play into the recession narrative.

For those of you that joined us on the MagicJack (Ticker: CALL) bandwagon are all sitting very good right now.  As we predicted the Company would rally as the market found out about the reverse merger opportunity after we called it out to our subscribers.

We still remain overly optimistic about the Company although we have been trading it in the last few days.  The Company is providing new telephone services much like Google (Ticker: GOOG) through Google Voice:

The company behind MagicJack has created a new program called MagicTalk that will have no calling fees when calling from computers, smart phones and iPads. Free is always good.

MagicTalk would go one better by eliminating fees for calling landline and cell phones in the U.S. and Canada, with no time limits on the calls.The software will be available next week for Windows and Mac computers. Versions for the iPhone, iPad, BlackBerry and Android phones will follow in September or October, said Dan Borislow, the CEO of VocalTec Communications Ltd.

We believe this is going to continue to make strides both in market share and price per share.  Watch for the new bottom on the current pull back we are having.  The hedge funds and speculative players pushed it up fast and a new bottom will form soon.

We always believe some of the best investment advice comes from looking at those that are successful around us. The same reason you come to us to find out relative profitable information to help you find the right investments, we also do this by scanning the industry and the experts in the fields and more specifically those that are making ungodly amounts of money.  Case in point….

With the help of our Fool peers here is a quick look at the stocks making it into Warren Buffet’s portfolio.

When it comes to investing, there’s a heck of a lot that Buffett can do that I simply can’t. For instance, back in the fear-filled days of 2008, he wrangled preferred stock yielding 10% from both Goldman Sachs and General Electric (NYSE: GE). He’s also been able to snatch up great privately held companies like See’s Candies and swallow whole public companies such as Burlington Northern Santa Fe. Such is the benefit of a sterling reputation, an eye for bargains, and a massive balance sheet.

But when it comes to common stocks, I can go after the exact same shares that Buffett is buying for Berkshire. And when it comes to one stock in particular, I am most definitely on the same page as Buffett. It’s Berkshire’s largest stock holding. It’s a staple among consumer staples. It is, of course, Coca-Cola (NYSE: KO).

Here are some similar stocks like Coca-Cola that we agree have the merits for us to buy and hold on to.

1. Altria (NYSE: MO) and Philip Morris International (NYSE: PM) may leave a bad taste in some investors’ mouths (no pun intended) since their business is slinging tobacco products. But as far as finding a business with a rock star of a product at its core, these two companies may out-Coke Coke. In the U.S. the Marlboro brand commands an amazing 42% of the cigarette market, and internationally it’s been the top brand since 1972. Marlboro’s 302 billion cigarettes sold internationally in 2009 beat the next three competitors combined.
2. Diageo (NYSE: DEO) could likewise be categorized as “sin stock,” but I’d prefer to categorize it as simply sinfully successful. Just as nothing needs to be done to keep the Coke product successful, Diageo doesn’t need to do much to keep leading brands like Smirnoff, Johnnie Walker, Guinness, Captain Morgan, and Jose Cuervo — to name a few — trucking along. Motley Fool Income Investor advisor James Early recently made Diageo his pick for The Motley Fool’s “11 O’Clock Stock” series, largely because of its amazing brand portfolio.
3. Procter & Gamble (NYSE: PG) doesn’t have a single product that provides the foundation of the company, but instead it has large portfolio of products. P&G does more tweaking to its products than Coke — think about the changes to Gillette razors or innovations for Pampers diapers — but brands like Tide, Vicks, Oral-B, Scope, Zest, and Old Spice don’t need significant technological advancements to keep the dollars rolling in.

For every type of trader there is, there are twice as many Market Indicators people use to determine the direction of the market. Some are based on Models, Short Skirts, and the latest chart topping songs. Some are logical others, astrological. There really is no limit. We’ve made a short video highlighting some of the quirkiest way people decipher what the market is going to look like. If you or anyone you know have any funky way to decide how to make your trades let us know! We will be collecting and compiling the information into an updated Daily Tape Readers Quirky Indicators!

China Architectural Engineering announced a new contract to build a resort near Shanghai causing shares to virtually double since we first featured the issue.The stock rose above $2 this morning with a bounce of almost 70%.  Things really started to pop yesterday in after hours trading when the news of the deal first broke.  The gains after hours are documented in the screen capture below and show when added to today’s the validity of our claim.